“You don’t get to decide that for me,” I nearly screech.
“Yes,” he says, his patience thinning. “I do.”
The words feel like a slap across the face. Who the hell does he think he is?
I stare at him, stunned. “Excuse me?”
“This isn’t a discussion,” he continues. “I don’t have time for questions. We’re going to have to move you to a safer location soon, so I need you to let me focus on the arrangements.”
“No,” I say, my voice shaking now. “I’m not going anywhere with you until you answer my questions.”
He looks at me for a long moment, then exhales sharply and rakes a hand through his hair.
“From what I can understand, your fiancé is not a very good man,” he says.
I laugh callously. “No shit, that was the whole reason?—”
“Not just the cheating,” he says gravely, cutting me off. “He has Bratva connections. There was a… situation.”
“What?” I ask, genuinely confused now.
“Men who are connected to him were sweeping the hotel after you left,” Andrei clarifies. “There was obviously a situation at hand, and your disappearance complicated their plans for the evening.”
My stomach drops. None of this makes any sense. I have to sit back down on the couch I only recently vacated.
“What kind of situation?” I ask in a small voice.
His eyes harden. “That is not your concern.”
“It’s very much my concern,” I snap. “If they’re looking for me, I deserve to know why!”
He steps closer, looming without trying to. “Your ex-fiancé is clearly a very dangerous man,” he says darkly. “With ties to somedangerous people. His actions this evening aside, I don’t think tonight was simply planned as an engagement party.”
I swallow hard, trying to make sense of his words and the jumble of thoughts circling my head. It’s all so ominous and vague.
“Kostya wouldn’t hurt me,” I say weakly. “Not like that. He’s a cheating asshole but he wouldn’t physically harm me.”
Andrei’s expression makes it clear what he thinks of that.
“We can’t be too careful.” He shrugs. “And because of your father, I can’t allow that risk.”
My head snaps up. “My father?” I ask in surprise. “What does he have to do with this?”
He studies me carefully now, like he’s deciding how much damage the truth is about to do.
“I recognized your last name when you said it in the elevator,” he says. “Your father works for me, Alina.”
The room starts to tilt, and I grab on to the couch just to gain some kind of balance. None of this makes any sense. Kostya being in the Bratva is one thing, but my father?
“No,” I say immediately. “That’s not possible. He’s a dock worker.”
The words sit there between us, heavy and unreal. My father is not a criminal.
He’s a man who wakes up before dawn and comes home with cracked hands and a stiff back. He’s a man who packs his lunch every morning and complains about the price of groceries. He’s the man who cried quietly at my mother’s funeral and never dated again. There’s no way he’s caught up in this.
Except suddenly, pieces start sliding into place whether I want them to or not.
He’s never, not once, allowed me to come down to visit him at the docks. There have been many nights, both in high school and college, where he would tell me not to go out. I’d try to argue, but he’d be very firm, saying he had a feeling things weren’t safe for me. There are wads of cash hidden all over our house in random places because he “doesn’t trust banks.”
